Army Wife
by Ashen Key
Summary: Today it isn't Teri who has to sit and wait for news, but as she snaps Kim's lunch-box shut, she knows who will be. OR: Teri has to deal with domesticity and some of the fallout from the 1993 Battle of Mogadishu.


**A/N: Written for sardonicynic, for Yuletide Madness 2011**

**Army Wife**

Teri sleeps in. Not by much, but she wakes up, looks at her clock, and goes, "Shit."

She needs to shower, she needs to get Kimmy ready for school (which means; breakfast, clothes, lunch, bus-no, it'll be car today), and she doesn't need to worry about Jack, because he's away on some secret training exercise (they're always secret, it goes with the Special Forces ethos).

She looks at the clock again.

"...Fuck."

Today isn't a shower day.

– –

"Mommy, the toast is wrong."

"How is it wrong?"

"It's the wrong shape."

"...Kimmy, it's Tuesday. You like your toast in triangles on Tuesdays."

"Well, it's wrong. I want circles. And it's _cold_."

"If you'd eaten it when I made it- Okay, you know what? I'll make it again. But then you have to _eat it_. Okay?"

"'Kay."

– –

Kim hits the wrong button on the TV. She shouldn't have been turning it on anyway, but she does, and she hits the wrong button. She gets CNN, and before Teri can tell her to turn it off, there are bodies on the screen.

There are bodies, and angry crowds, and dances of jubilation around a crashed helicopter. The reporter is talking about Mogadishu and dead American soldiers, and Teri lunges for the remote to turn the damn thing off.

"Mommy?"

Kim's gone wide-eyed, uncertain.

"It's okay, baby." Teri crouches down to look her in the eye. "Those bad things on the TV? They're a long way away." Kim's expression doesn't change for a moment, and Teri starts to worry that she'll ask about Jack. Is Kim old enough to make the leap between the images on screen and her father? No uniforms, which had always been Kim's link, but Teri's mind starts to run with explanations anyway. _Daddy isn't there, he's on a camping trip with Steve and Rob, he's safe._

Kim just nods, and Teri breathes a sigh of relief as she hugs her daughter.

"Now, shoes, Kimmy? Where are your shoes?"

– –

She never wanted to be an Army Wife. When she was eight months pregnant with Kim, she walked into a room full of women married to soldiers; by the time she walked out, she promised herself that no matter what the hell Jack was doing, she was _not_ going to turn into someone whose whole life was dictated by her husband's deployment.

So far, she's keeping that promise – she's a post-graduate student, not a housewife - but some days, being an Army Wife isn't so bad. The others are women who get it, after all. They get the bouts of being a functional single-parent, they get having those sleepless nights, they get all the unique frustrations of Army bureaucracy. They get the need to sometimes have their hand held by others who understand while they sit, and wait, and hope like crazy that their husband hasn't been killed.

Today it isn't not Teri who has to sit and wait, but as she snaps Kim's lunch-box shut, she knows who will be.

"Hey, Leah, it's me Teri."

"Teri. Hey." Even over the phone, Leah sounds tense. Leah never sounds tense.

"Yeah, look, I just saw the news-"

"Could you come over?"

For a brief moment, Teri wants to say 'no'. 'No, Leah, I have class,' and 'no, Leah, I don't want to deal with the stress because I have my own'. Even though she knew what she was offering when she dialled Leah, Teri had been hoping that one of the other wives had gotten there first.

"Yeah, I can come over," she says. "I just have to drop Kim off at school."

Leah laughs, and doesn't sound like her self. "Sure, sure. I mean, I'll be here. Where else would I be going?"

– –

Leah holds herself together.

She cracks her normal jokes, helps rearrange the living room so Teri can spread out her notes and work on her latest assignment (not that she does much work, but it's the gesture of normalcy that counts), and Teri gives her the courtesy of not noticing the way she goes tense when a car slows down in front of her house.

– –

There is a knock on the front door, and Leah says, "Don't get that."

"Leah-"

"No." Leah shakes her head, her hands curling into fists. "Don't. Please."

"C'mon, Leah," Teri says gently. "I'll be right here."

She keeps her word, so she's able to catch her before she crumples to floor after the mortuary affairs officer says, "Mrs Carey, it's about your husband."

– –

Teri calls in reinforcements when it's time to pick up Kim. Leah doesn't notice, either to say thank you or to object; Teri doesn't blame her.

She gets into her car, drives to Kim's school, and allows herself exactly ten minutes to cry.

She hates this. She hates the worry, the fear, the _need_ for a damn support network, and she hates that there is actually a reason for all that fear.

She hates it, and she takes a deep breath, dries her eyes, fixes her make-up, and goes to pick up her daughter from class like any other parent.


End file.
